Leo before and after the videos

Leo, my motorcycle (named such by my wife), is a mountain goat ...Leo, not my wife.  I made that clear right?  Boy, I hope so.  In this case I mean moutain goat as a supreme compliment ...none-the-less, I have never met a woman who want's to be called a mountain goat.  My bike is a mountain goat in that it will go anywhere  ...I found out today ...by accident.  hee hee!

So, the videos.  They're a little boring.  The first one is at the beginning of my off road ride.  The last one is at the end of the off road ride.  I just wanted to give my friends and family a glimpse of what I do in my spare time.  But today it's what happened in the middle of my ride that made if fun ...scary ...stressful ...awesome. 

I got lost again.  Thought I was on one squiggly line on my gazeteer, and I was on another squiggly line... dag-nab-it!  But, my lack of orienteering skills lead to a pretty cool adventure.  I was not entirely sure I would make it through ...at least not with Leo.  I mean it wasn't a "Hey ya'll, watch this" kinda of thing, but it wasn't too far off.

Shad.  Shad was in my motorcycle safety course a couple of months ago.  Where does one get a name like Shad?  I do not know, but a couple of weeks ago Ginger and I saw another Shad working at Panera.  So, obviously it's not that strange of a name.  It's just that in my 43 years I have never known, or even met, a Shad.  I told Shad I wanted to ride my motorcycle up to Butt Mountain ...seriously, it's called Butt Mountain.  I guess they were fresh out of names or maybe just tired when they named it.  Anyway, Shad told me that he would not advise trying to ride the jeep trail up to Butt Mountain.  He takes his 4x4 up there some time.  He said there are some huge mud holes.  He said that the water came up over his hood in one of them.  He didn't seem like a liar.  I figured I would just not take the Jeep trail.

Today I took the Jeep trail down from Butt Mountain.  It was intense.  I was lost, though for the greater part of the time I did not know I was lost.  In fact I was rather confident that I knew exactly where I was.  I did not know.

If there were two mud holes there where 50.  I've never seen anything like it.  It was made all the more scary by the thought of water deep enough to wash over Shad's hood.  "Hey ya'll, watch this".  If I could get around them I did, but some there was just no way to get around.  By mud holes I mean they covered the road side to side and some were 20 to 30 feet long.  The funny thing is the only time I went in truly deep water I didn't even know it was there.  I was avoiding a giant mud hole, riding to the side as much as I could.  I spotted strange, perfectly flat place covered with leaves right in front of me, but didn't think too much about it ...I was avoiding something much bigger.  Then I hit the flat spot ...the 2 1/2 foot deep water hole covered with floating leaves.  My entire front wheel disappeared ...as did my feet.  I hit the gas ..hard.  I know some people are "In case of emergency, hit the brakes" kind of folks (my wife for one), but I am definitely an "In case of emergency, hit the gas" person.  Now it does lead to some "Hey ya'll, watch this" moments, I'll admit.  But for the most part it works out well for me.


For over an hour my ride consisted of dodging, or going through, giant mud holes and riding on insanely rocky ground.  Like I said it was stressful at times, but that's part of why it was awesome.  The videos are pretty boring.  They are the calm before and after the storm.  Hopefully they will be somewhat enjoyable.  See ya next time!